Sen. Dan Bishop -- NC's Poster Child for White Supremacy

The Pittsburgh synagogue killer posted "I'm going in!" on a Far Right social media platform called Gab (which is currently displaying just a declaration that it's not going away, although for the moment, it's away, shut down, caput).

News surfaced this past week that the only known investor in Gab is a North Carolina member of the NC Senate, Dan Bishop, who gave the start-up $500 through its crowd-funding push in 2017.

Here's the crucial evidence for what Senator Bishop thought he was supporting with his $500. This headline in the Washington Post: "Silicon Valley escalates its war on white supremacy despite free speech concerns." The article was about the unheralded struggle of racists to get their racism out into the American mass-media bloodstream without a lot of social media gatekeepers (like PayPal) crying "racism" and shutting them down.

And Senator Dan Bishop thought, Yassir! That's who I want to give my money to! According to reporter Billy Corriher, "The senator tweeted about his investment in Gab on Aug. 17, 2017, saying he had just read about the company in a Washington Post article .... After reading this, Bishop said that he's 'about done with [San Francisco] tech giants' Big Brother routine' and implied that the companies' banning of white supremacists was a form of 'tyranny.' "

Exposed as a promoter of Gab, Senator Bishop now says this: If Gab "allows its users to promote violence, anti-Semitism, and racism on the platform, they have certainly misled investors." In an editorial, the Charlotte Observer said that to believe Bishop's defense, "you also would need to believe he wasn't aware in 2017 of Gab's links to hate groups — despite common knowledge and the article he cited — and that he did not investigate or even explore the site before giving it $500 of his money."

Bishop was only elected to the NC Senate in 2016 after serving in the NC House. He was opposed this year in the Republican primary by Beth Monaghan, a credible, moderate Republican woman upset with Bishop's authorship of the notorious HB2 "Bathroom Bill." We wrote extensively about Monaghan back in April as the primary approached, hoping there was still life in moderate Republicanism in North Carolina. Unfortunately, there wasn't life.

Chad Stachowicz with his family

Bishop's Democratic challenger next Tuesday ... Chad Stachowicz. I'm cannabilizing what I wrote about Stachowicz in April:

Stachowicz is CEO of Cloverhound, an IT company he founded that has employees in North Carolina, Colorado, and Ohio. He describes himself as "socially liberal but fiscally conservative." "A fiscal conservative to me means spending money in the right way and making sure we get a return on our investment," Stachowicz says. The public investment needs to be in education, sure, but there are different kinds of educations that deserve our support: “I come from a generation where they preach that college is the only way to make it. That is a way to go for some, but an electrician is a job here in North Carolina where there is a great need. An electrician will make close to $70,000 once they finish their apprenticeship, which is two years."

The North Carolina Association of Educators (NCAE) has endorsed Sachowicz. So has Planned Parenthood Votes! South Atlantic. And the New South Progressives. And Moms Demand Action.

I haven't followed Stachowicz's campaign. I hope he's been running hard and effectively, and I hope that the voters in the 39th senatorial district (Mecklenburg County) think that maybe Dan Bishop isn't the sort of man they want representing them in the future.